April Benton is one of nine children in the world that suffers with a form of bilateral striatal necrosis, which affects her mobility and fine motor skills.
April from Malton had a normal childhood like most her age until in 2013 when she was 18 months old, April contracted a virus which resulted in her immune system being compromised and it attacked her brain. An MRI confirmed April’s brain damage, this is the most severe on the right-hand side of her brain which affects the movement and brain signals to the left side of her body. To make things worse, there is damage also present on the opposite side too.
“As her parents we are incredibly proud of her, she is a credit to herself whilst she remained the happy, smiley girl she always had been. April never complains, she just gets on with life, even when we take her to her numerous hospital appointments to monitor her needs.”
April attends St Mary’s RC School in Malton, she cannot manage full days but does love to be there with her friends. April has a splint fit for her left leg and a walking frame to help her have some independence as well as an adapted car seat. April has very limited use of her left hand which makes everyday activities frustrating and exhausting for her. “At school she has a tablet and keyboard as she struggles to write and she has a reading board as she cannot hold books,”
“As there is so little known she could remain stable or she could deteriorate dramatically,”
“April is now 7, she is growing so fast that we have realised our home is no longer fit to meet with her growing needs, or ours.”
“This fundraising is about April gaining her independence where possible, and for us to future proof our home for.”
In 2018 our family was approached by Richard who operates sports classes in our local school, and he organised a team of fundraisers to take on the challenge of swimming the equivalent of the English Channel – all 21 miles of it. This swim is to help raise funds towards much needed equipment and alterations to April’s home environment
There are still a few people left to complete their Channel Swim challenge which they embarked upon last summer. Karen Darley from the Gazette is one of the Channel Swimmers, she has already completed her 21 mile swim, so she decided to swim back too. An incredible achievement to swim 42 miles to help raise funds for April
Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances the previous crowd-funding page was closed down before Christmas by the provider and all supporters of the cause were refunded. The previous page had already met it’s original target, naturally we were devastated to have received such terrible news. Once we knew each contributor had received their refund, we launched a new crowd-funding page to try to recover some of the previous funds which had been raised.
My son is in the same class as April, she is a lovely little girl, never without a smile. Like all children, she is always game to try anything and to have a nice time. Both Paul and Sarah work full time and want April to be able to do as much as possible. Children grow so fast and April is no different.
If you can, give this family a helping hand and make a donation, CLICK HERE to go to justgiving.com/crowdfunding/sarah-benton
